APPENDIX TO CASE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 697 
to perform, and to pay therefor a fair and just compensation, such as may be fixed 
by the Secretary of the Treasury.” And also the Company ‘‘agrees to contribute as 
far as in its power all reasonable efforts to secure the comfort, health, education, 
and promote the morals and civilization of said native inhabitants.” 
In short, then, the means of living, the facilities for education, the care of health, 
the religious teaching, the training of the young, and the comfort of the old, in a 
community of over 300 persons, are all imposed upon the Company as its solemn 
duty by specific Articles of the lease. I inclose you a copy of Census of 1890, giving 
every name of the 303 persons, old and young, male and female, who constitute the 
whole community of the Pribyloff Islands.* 
8 The duties thusimposed upon the Company must be discharged annually with 
punctuality and exactness. The comfort, possibly the safety, of all these 
human beings, peculiarly helpless when left to themselves, is dependent upon the 
Company under the lease, and the lessees are paid therefor by the Government in the 
seal-skins which the Company receive for the service. If the Company shall, asyou 
say Lord Salisbury requests, be deprived of all privilege of taking seals, they cer- 
tainly could not be compelled to minister to the wants of these 300 inhabitants for 
an entire year. If these islanders are to he left to charity, the North American 
Company is under no greater obligation to extend it to them than are other citizens 
of the United States. It evidently requires a considerable sum of money to furnish 
all the supplies named in the lease—supplies which must be carried 4,000 miles on a 
specially chartered steamer. If the lessees are not to be allowed payment in any 
form for the amount necessary to support these 300 people on the islands, they will 
naturally decline to expend it, 
No appropriation of money has been made by Congress for the purpose, and the 
President cannot leave these worthy and innocent people to the hazard of starvation 
even to secure any form of Agreement with Lord Salisbury touching seal life. Seal 
life may be valuable, but the first duty of the Government of the United States in 
this matter is to protect human life. 
In this exigency, the President instructs me to propose to Lord Salisbury that he 
concede to the North American Company the right to take a sufficient number of 
seals, and no more than sufficient, to recompense them for their outlay in taking 
care of the natives, and that, in the phrase of the President, all ‘‘commercial killing 
of seals be prohibited pending the result of arbitration.” 
The Secretary of the Treasury has a right to fix the number necessary to the end 
desired. After full consideration, he has limited the number to 7,500 to be killed 
by the Company to repay them for the outlay demanded for the support of the 300 
people on the Pribyloff Islands. 
He further directs that no females be killed, and that thus the productive capacity 
of the herd shall not in the slightest degree be impaired. 
This point being fixed and agreed to, the proposed Arrangement between the two 
countries would be as follows: 
The Government of the United States limits the number of seals to be killed on 
the islands for purposes just described to 7,500. 
The Government of the United States guarantees that no seals shall be killed in 
the open waters of Behring’s Sea by any person on any vessel sailing under the 
American flag, or by any American citizen sailing under any other flag. 
The Government of Great Britain guarantees that no seals shall be killed in the 
open waters of Behring’s Sea by any person on any vessel sailing under the British 
flag, and that no British subject shall engage in killing seals for the time agreed 
upon on any vessel sailing under any other flag. 
These prohibitions shall continue until the Ist day of May, 1892, within which 
time the Arbitrators shall render final award or awards to both Governments. 
These several propositions are submitted for the consideration of Lord Salisbury. 
The President believes that they are calculated to produce a result at once fair and 
honourable to both Governments, and thus lead to the permanent adjustment of a 
controversy which has already been left too long at issue. 
Ihave, &c. 
(Signed) J. G. BLAINE. 
*¥or Inclosure, see Inclosure in Sir J. Pauncefote’s despatch, dated February 20, 
1891: Appendix, No. 1. 
